/*
 * Copyright 2008-2009 ArtisanLogic.com.
 *
 * Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
 * you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
 * You may obtain a copy of the License at
 *
 *     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
 *
 * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
 * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
 * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
 * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
 * limitations under the License.
 */
package com.artisanlogic.io;

import java.io.Closeable;

// =====================================================================================================================
// StreamTask.java                                                                               Created on Feb 19, 2009
// ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/**
 * A I/O operation to be executed against a I/O stream in the context of a StreamTemplate
 * 
 * @author sean@artisanlogic.com
 * @since 0.9-Beta
 */
// =====================================================================================================================
public interface StreamTask<StreamType extends Closeable> {
  
  // -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  // public abstract methods
  // -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
	
  /**
   * The StreamTemplate will call into this method to get the stream that will be operated on in this StreamTask's 
   * execution.
   * 
   * @return This method returns the stream that will be operated on in this StreamTask's execution.
   * @throws Exception This method will throw an instance of Exception if an error is encountered while creating or 
   *  acquiring the stream to be returned.
   */
	StreamType getStream() throws Exception;
	
	/**
	 * This method execute's this StreamTask with the provided stream.
	 * 
	 * @param stream This parameter holds the stream that this StreamTask operates on to execute its task.
	 * @throws Exception This method will throw an instance of Exception if an unrecoverable error is encountered while 
	 *   performing its task.
	 */
	void execute(StreamType stream) throws Exception;

}
